The Legend of a Paladin
by spades7717
Summary: When the being born of darkness reigns and all hope seems lost, the holy Paladin of legend will emerge from the flames to return light to the world. Magic, Adventure and Romance await...
1. Into the Flames

**The Legend of a Paladin-** Chapter 1: Into the Flames

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This story has taken me forever to develop. Plus it's pretty different from some of my other stories. I decided to take a step away from High school fanfics for a little while. I felt as if I had been stabbing it to death. This story is more of a Final Fantasy theme, meaning Magic, weapons and a really kick ass story line that always seems to surprise you. 

I hope you all enjoy it!

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An elven archer runs through the forest towards a city engulfed in flames with nothing more than a bow and a quiver full of arrows hanging from his right shoulder. He stopped once after hearing a noise in the clearing. He immediately strung his bow and aimed it at the source of the noise. He held his breath in hopes that it was simply a creature of the forest stirring.

_Get a hold of yourself, Wakka. _The orange haired archer thought as he continued his journey to the burning city. He arrived at the outskirts of the city and became entranced in the dancing inferno before him. He shook his head and entered the flaming city of Kilika to continue his mission of finding any lone survivors of the massacre.

"Is anyone there!" He shouted at the top of his lungs in hopes of hearing any voice at all. When there was no response he continued along the path. Dead bodies were laying everywhere he looked covered in pools of blood. _What the hell happened here?_

All of a sudden the archer heard an ear piercing scream come from a hut in the distance. He dodged a falling tree and kicked down the door on the hut, "Hello!" There was no answer so he ascended the stairs. To his surprise he found a young male lying on his back unconscious. His blonde hair and flawless tanned skin had remained completely untouched by the effects of the fire. The archer ran to him and checked for a pulse and to his relief there was one. He looked at his ears and noticed that they had no point. _He's human._ He picked up the blonde, slung him over his shoulder and exited the hut.

The fire that was slowly consuming the entire village continued to become worse by the second. _It's no use the fire is too strong. I have to leave._

The archer ran through the flames creating new routes as he ran and found it increasingly harder to maneuver through the random fires and dropping debris with the enhanced weight on his back.

He ran the whole way back to his hometown and continued towards his hut. When he entered there were two people waiting for him. The first was a tall elf with long black flowing hair and skin as pale as the moonlight. The other elf in the room was slightly shorter than the other one and looked no older than seventeen with her short brown hair and multicolored eyes. One an intense swirling green vortex and the other was a sea of blue.

"Is he the only one left?" The taller elf asked.

The orange haired archer nodded and rested the blonde male off his back to lay him on the bed in the corner. The archer looked down and folded his arms and spoke to the unconscious blonde whom he knew could not answer, "Maybe you can give us some answers, ya?"

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It had been almost a week since the archer had found the unconscious blonde human in the burning city and he still had yet to awaken. They had tried everything they could think of to try to wake the seemingly lifeless being but with each newly failed attempt the likelihood of him awakening seemed farther off.

The brunette elf continued along with her usual tasks as she did everyday. She dipped a cloth in clean water and twisted it so that it was damp and headed over to the unconscious blonde laying on the bed. She wiped the cloth across his forehead and down to he cheek.

The brunette had found that she enjoyed staring into the face of the man in front of her. To her, he felt so comforting and she took pleasure in watching over him everyday. Then, as if lightening had struck him, the young male's eyes shot open.

The multi-eye colored elf jumped back as she noticed and felt herself caught up in two deep, oceanic eyes looking back at her. She sprinted out of the hut leaving the blonde male alone and extremely confused.

A few seconds later the orange haired archer entered the hut to see the blonde male sitting up and looking at the vicinity around him, "So you decided to wake up sleepy head? You've taken quite the nap, ya?"

"Where…where am I?" The blonde asked.

"It's a long story, but before I explain at least tell me your name, ya?"

"My name? It's…" He looked to floor trying desperately to recall just what it was, "I can't remember."

The orange man sighed, "I was afraid of that. We had reason to suspect that Sin was the cause of the attack so it's only natural that you have no memories."

"What do you mean? And who is Sin?"

The archer gave a faint smile as he crossed his arms, "You really did lose you memories, didn't you?" The blonde male remained silent. The two elf females entered the room and stood near the door.

"Yuna just told me he woke up," the black haired elf said. She gazed over towards the person on the bed, "And by the looks of it she was right." She took a few steps closer to him and tilted her head as if she was examining every inch of him. She placed her hand on his face and turned it in both directions.

"What's the verdict, Lu?"

"I wont know for sure until I give him a real test but for now he's no apparent threat."

"In that case I should probably make the introductions," he turned towards the extremely confused blonde on the bed, "I'm Wakka, this girl right here is Lulu and the one in the back is Yuna."

"Nice to meet you. Now tell me, where am I? Why can't I remember anything?"

"You can't remember anything?" Lulu asked, "That proves that Sin really was the cause of all of this."

"Who is Sin?" The blonde shouted, "Will someone explain what is going on!"

"Sin is an unholy Anti-Paladin," everyone turned to Yuna who was now walking towards the middle of the room, "He is all that we know to be evil and vicious in the world that we live in. The legend says that he was born from the darkest depths of the underworld and sent to Spira to exterminate the world of all of its happiness and joy."

"Usually when you encounter Sin he drains the memories from you," Wakka interrupted, "And that's what we expect happened to you. About a week ago, I got word that the city closet to us, Kilika, had been attacked and was in chaos. I left here alone and went to Kilika to look for any survivors. All I found was you in a building on fire and for some reason you seem to be the only one who survived. I was hoping you could tell me what happened."

"Most of the time if you revisit the place where you lost your memories you can recover some of them. And since your conscious now we can go back to Kilika. I doubt there will be any survivors but we can always keep our eyes open."

The blonde sat on the bed still completely confused as to what was going on around him, _Why can't I remember?_

"Hold it." Lulu said, "I need to test him before we go anywhere. I need to find out what your true intentions are."

"How are you supposed to figure that out?" The blonde human asked as he ran his fingers through his hair.

"Easily, with magic of course." Lulu said, "Meet me by the beach and I shall perform what is necessary."

"Magic?" He asked but the woman had already exited the hut. He stood and headed for the exit but was quickly halted by an arm in the way.

"I should probably tell you that Lulu is what we call a necromancer. She has the ability to raise the dead to do her bidding and produce extremely powerful magic with nothing more than a few words. She is a very powerful ally but also a dangerous enemy. Don't piss her off or you'll regret it, ya? She's got one hell of a temper." Wakka exited the hut and was soon followed by the young human.

He caught up with Wakka and started asking him questions, "So Lulu is a necromancer. What are you?"

Wakka smiled, "I'm an archer, or rather, a ranger. I fight mostly with a bow and arrow. I'm in tune with the voice of nature and understand her will. I suppose you want to know what Yuna is too, ya?" The blonde nodded, "She's a cleric. She specializes in healing wounds and providing us with increased abilities such as making our armor twice as strong. It requires a lot of discipline and a lot of praying to the Gods to become one of those, ya?"

The human's eyes suddenly stopped at Wakka's ears, "Your ears, they're…pointed!"

Wakka let out a loud laugh, "Of course they are! What kind of elf would I be if they weren't?"

"Elf?" The blonde asked as he tilted his head a little.

The archer let out another chuckle, "I keep forgetting you don't know anything, ya? The entire world of Spira is populated with tons of races, everything from the cloud giants on Mt. Gagazet, to elves to even humans. I am a part of the Elven race. One of our most obvious features is our pointed ears which make us easy to identify from other races such as humans. But it isn't just that, we also have far greater speed, strength, and magical powers. Yuna and Lulu are also elves."

The blonde immediately shot his hand up to his ears and felt the smooth, point-less surface of his ear double-checking to make sure he wasn't an elf, for all he knew he could have been.

They found themselves at the beach where Lulu stood patiently awaiting them and Yuna was sitting on a rock playing with something that looked similar to a seashell, "Stand here."

"What exactly is this suppose to do?"

"I'm going to cast a spell to reveal the color of you aura. It'll affect everyone in the area."

"And how will I know if it works?"

Lulu sighed becoming increasing annoyed at the never ending series of stupid questions that were presented before her, "If you aura turns silver your intentions and heart are of good faith, however, if it reveals a black aura you heart is full of darkness and corruption and you must be exterminated immediately." The blonde's heart skipped a beat at those last two words: _Exterminated immediately…_

Lulu took a step forward, "Don't move." She flicked her wrist and a ball of light appeared around her hand, "God of Eternal Light hear my calling!" The light in her hand grew twice as bright. She slowing moved her arm across the air in front of her leaving a trail of light in the places in which her hand had been, "Assist me in my journey into the heart and souls of all that surround me." She spun around in a circle leaving a trail of light as she went, "Reveal to me what your hearts truly contains!"

The circle of light that encased Lulu moved towards the sky where it spun uncontrollably before shooting down to the area around them.

The young male was breathless from what he had just seen, _How did she do that?_ He looked at Lulu who was glowing the silvery color she said those true of heart would. He wasn't sure if he was just seeing things but he could have sworn that Yuna's aura was brighter than Wakka and Lulu's but quickly diminished the thought when he saw the looks he was getting from the three of them.

The blonde looked down at his hands and found that they were not glowing the silvery color he was hoping for. They weren't even surrounded by the black darkness that had been described for him. Instead was a golden aura that surrounded his entire being, "What does that mean, Lu?"

"I'm not sure. I've never seen anything like this before. It's completely unheard of…"

"Then I say we still take him with us. Maybe we can find some answers within the ashes of Kilika. Until then I don't think it's fair to just kill him for no reason, ya?" Wakka said.

Lulu looked to Yuna, "What do you think?"

"I think he should come with us!" Yuna said tilting her head and showing a smile.

Lulu hesitated before adding, "Alright. But if he so much as makes a wrong move I'm not holding Kimahri back."

"Kimahri? Is that like you pet dog or something?"

There was a small pause before Wakka and Yuna burst out laughing. Even Lulu couldn't help but silently giggle, "I dare you to ask him that once you meet him!"

Suddenly the young human felt the ground rumble beneath him and he almost tripped, catching himself before he feel, "What was that!"

"It seems Kimahri's timing is impeccable."

The blonde turned around to be faced with a being almost twice his height towering over him glowing a striking silver. In his hand was a long staff with a razor-sharp axe on the very top. The creature let out a growl from deep within his throat. The blonde jumped back and scrambled to flee away from him. In doing so, he narrowly escaped the blade as it sank into the ground a mere foot away from him where he had previously been standing.

"What was that for!" The blonde screamed while breathing heavily. The air around them sent a chill down Tidus' back as the wind blew. As if the breeze had blown away the shining lights surrounding them, their auras disappeared into the atmosphere.

"There's no need to kill him Kimahri, ya?" Wakka said, "He's my new bud, right brudda?"

The blonde just nodded, to afraid to even speak his thoughts.

"This is Kimahri. He's a cloud giant from Mt. Gagazet. Kimahri, our friend here has lost all his memories and we're hoping he can regain them by visiting Kilika tomorrow."

Kimahri's eyes squinted at the human and grunted to show his confirmation. He leaped back into the trees where he had appeared from, "So it's final! We all leave for Kilika in the morning, ya?"

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I hope you all enjoyed it so far as many plot twists and events are soon to come. Please **REVIEW** for me! I really want to know if it's something I should continue with. 


	2. Hidden Skills

**The Legend of a Paladin-** Chapter 2: Hidden Skills

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Finally, the chapter is complete. I really am sorry it took me so long. School... 

NOTE: Before you read you should know about the gris-gris bags. I consider them the most random thing Squaresoft has ever created. Therefore, my friends and I make fun of them constantly. I couldn't help but sneak in the mention of the gris-gris bag in this story. (How the hell is a gris-gris bag going to help prevent curse? Honestly...)

Enjoy...

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"Is everything ready, Wakka?" Lulu asked as she packed the last fragment of rope in her gris-gris bag.

"Almost, I just have to pack the last bit of supplies and we're out of here, ya?" Wakka said as he shoved a piece of dried, salted meat into his gris-gris bag and slung it over his shoulder. He strung his bow and grabbed his quiver full of arrows.

"Are you sure it's wise to take that human with us? I know his aura wasn't black, but it wasn't silver either. For all we know he could have been a minion of Sin." Lulu inquired.

"Come on, Lu. Have some faith, ya? If he was a minion of Sin then why would he have all his memories drained?" Wakka said as he was about to exit the hut.

"I'm not sure but this whole thing just seems so suspicious…" Lulu exited the hut in deep thought.

"Besides, once we get to Kilika we'll all be going our own separate ways, ya?" Wakka found the human pacing back and forth and Yuna petting a squirrel, "Are you both ready to go?"

"Uh-huh," the blonde said, "Off to Kilika we go!"

"Good, 'cause fiends are everywhere out there and we need to be ready to face them."

"Fiends? You mean like monsters!" The human shrieked.

"What's the matter, brudda? You never seen a fiend before?" Wakka sighed, "Wait right here." He ran back inside his hut and came out with an object placed beneath a large piece of cloth.

"I thought I'd never bring this out after that day…" Wakka said as he pulled back the cloth to reveal a long, blue sword that swirled around inside of it's self as if there was a hurricane bursting to come out.

The young blonde slowly approached Wakka without taking his eyes off of the sword presented before him. Wakka gave a sad smile and tossed it at him, "Take good care of it, ya?"

"It's for me?"

"Of course it is, brudda! I don't need it anyway. All I've gotta have is my good ol' bow, ya?"

Lulu looked to the ground as the human swung around his new sword, hacking and slashing the air, obviously having no clue what he was doing, "What are you doing?"

"Practicing. It's not like I've ever used a sword before."

"Are you serious? How could you have never used a sword before! Even the kids in the village have used them at least once, ya?" Wakka sighed, "Well, I guess there's nothing we can do about it now. Just keep practicing and you'll get the hang of it, brudda."

The group picked up their stuff and headed out the rusted metal gates that surrounded the city. They continued down the dirt path that lay before them and slowly became farther and father away for the quiet echoes of the sea.

The young human stopped suddenly and looked at the bush beside him. Wakka noticed and stopped walking, "What's the matter, brudda?"

"It's nothing, I just thought I heard something in the bushes." The blonde turned his glance back to the dirt road in front of him, gazing back once to confirm that he was just seeing things. He caught up to Wakka and the others as they continued their journey to Kilika.

The human couldn't help but continue looking at the bush behind him as it slowly faded into the distance. He heard a sudden scream come from ahead of him and quickly turned back around. A wolfish fiend with long, jagged fangs had appeared out of the bushes and was crouched down, about to pounce on Yuna, who had fallen to the ground.

"Yuna!" Lulu said as she took a step towards her, "Dancing inferno glowing bright, Bring forth to me your blazing might!" The second the words escaped from Lulu's mouth a burst of flames shot from her hands. The fiend shrieked in pain and fell over onto its side dead.

The human stood wide-eyed at the event he had just witnessed. _Wakka was right! She completely destroyed that fiend with nothing more than a few words! Memo to self: Never piss Lulu off…_

Lulu walked quickly over to Yuna and helped her to stand, "Are you alright?"

Yuna nodded, "Thank you, Lulu." She dusted off her outfit and recovered her staff from the ground. It was the first time the blonde had really noticed her staff. It was made entirely of what seemed like a shiny silver. A single silver cord wrapped itself around the staff leading to a mass of rose quartz that lay atop the structure. The object must have cost a fortune, the human thought to himself.

But before he could say anything there was another rustle from the bushes and without even having a chance to take in another breath, an entire swarm of fiends started to pour out. They came in mass quantities but the thing that made the human's jaw drop was the massive fiend that appeared behind the small army, "What the hell _is _that thing!"

The boss-like fiend was almost three times the height of the human, covered in huge grayish scales and had a claw on each side of it's massive body that looked as if it could crush a skull with nothing more than a tiny pinch.

Lulu squinted her eyes at the fiend and repeated her previous spell. The flame burst once again from her hands and made contact with the fiend. To her surprise, when the flame hit the fiend it did nothing more than vanish against the scales. The massive fiend roared and swung one of its enormous claws at Lulu. It was successful and managed to hit her in the stomach. She went flying backwards and stopped just short of a tree.

Wakka jumped atop a tree and shot an arrow directly at the fiend but it deflected off of the hard scales and almost hit Kimahri. "Damn it!" he shouted.

Fiends continued to pour out of the bushes as Kimahri tried his hardest to kill them off. The human on the other hand, had been merely hacking and slashing at the air afraid something might try to attack him. Eventually the fiends were smart enough to realize that Kimahri was successfully killing off big portions of the fiends. They then decided to all attack him at once and he immediately found that things were becoming increasingly harder.

Wakka continued to pull out arrows from his quiver and shot them out as fast as he could, "Hey brudda!" he screamed to the human, "You've got to kill off the boss fiend!"

"What? I can barely hold up this sword let alone _kill_ anything with it!" The human complained.

"You'll have to figure it out! Lulu's magic wont work on it, not that she's even conscious right now, my arrows just deflect off of it and Kimahri's swamped! I'll cover you as best as I can from up here," he shot off another arrow at a fiend that was becoming increasingly close to the unconscious Lulu, "Hurry!"

Yuna had appeared behind the human with her staff at hand, "I can help you, too."

The blonde nodded and led the way down the road towards where the boss fiend was bashing his claw against a nearby tree. Wakka diminished fiends with his bow and arrows if they got tooclose to Tidus and Yuna.

When they were only a few yards away from the huge fiend Yuna grabbed a hold of the blonde's wrist, "Wait. Stand there for a second." She took a step back and held her staff in both hands, "Oh Quartz of rose and pinkend hue, I ask for strength and protection true." Sparks of pink light materialized around Yuna's staff. They swirled around each other before soaring over to the human and surrounding him with their rose light. The blonde stared down at his body in amazement. Yuna gave him a smile, "That should help."

"Thanks," he said before jumping forward. _That's weird; my sword feels light as a feather now…_

"Hey! You, Mr. Ugly!" The blonde shouted as he took his fighter stance with his sword balancing in his right hand. The fiend turned its entire body towards the human and stared down at him with his small, black eyes. "Ya, that's right! I'm talking to you. Give me you're best shot!"

The fiend growled and swung his massive claw at the human. The blonde managed to dodge the giant claw with a jump in the air. Time seemed to stop as his legs flew backwards over his head in midair. He landed on his feet, almost losing his balance. _How the hell did I do that!_

The blonde was in such shock at his landing that he failed to realize the second wave of attack coming at him from the additional claw. It hit his side and sent him flying into a tree.

The blonde looked at the fiend as he lay against the tree. His vision was becoming blurry, focusing in and out on the fiend. He lifted his hand up to his head and felt the bump where his head had hit the tree. He looked down at his fingertips to find them wet with his own blood. Despite his wounds, he pushed himself upwards to a standing position and grabbed his sword that had fallen at his side. "Is that the best you've got!" the blonde shouted before charging towards the fiend.

The fiend roared once again and swung his claw at the blonde. The human expected the attack and leapt to the side. The fiend followed through with his other claw but the human was smart enough to know it was coming and quickly did a back flip over the claw landing with perfect balance on his feet. He knew that this would be the best time to charge so he quickly lunged forward and did a somersault towards the creature. Without so much as a moment of hesitation, he drove the sword into the belly of the fiend and watched as it squealed in pain.

A blue ooze seeped out from the wound as the fiend swung his claws around frantically, knocking down several trees in the process. Before long the fiend collapsed to the ground in pain and moments later it was dead. The second the fiend's remains turned into pyerflies the wolfish fiends stopped flowing from the depths of the bushes.

"Good going, brudda!" Wakka cheered from the tree. He was firing arrows as fast as he could to kill off the remaining fiends. By now Lulu had remained consciousness and was firing off spells as fast as she could say them.

The human stood with his hands and arms covered in the nasty blue ooze that had spewed from the gigantic fiend. His vision had become so blurry to the point where he could barely make out anything but the outlines of the dying fiends. He felt his legs give out beneath him as he fell onto the dirt path.

Kimahri was finally gaining some ground on the massive pack of fiends that surrounded him and would soon be fully rid of them. He spun his staff above his head before he gave a large swoop, instantly killing three fiends.

Yuna had finally made her way over to the blonde and dropped to her knees. The elf held her staff in her hands. She said a spell that the human was too groggy to hear and he felt an instant sense of relaxation. The throbbing in his head had stopped which was definitely a good thing and soon enough his vision went back to normal just in time to see Wakka, Lulu, and Kimahri finish off the last of the wolfish fiends.

Wakka jumped down from the tree and headed towards the blonde sitting on the ground, "You alright, brudda?"

The human nodded, "Yeah. What were all those fiends doing out here! And what was with that huge one?"

"I can't say that I know, ya? But I saw you with that sword! You were amazing, ya?"

"A little too amazing," Lulu said with a glare as she approached them, "I thought you said you had never used a sword before? I've never seen anyone wield a sword as naturally as you, especially not someone who claims to have never used a sword."

The blonde felt an overwhelming sense of confusing, "It was mostly Yuna. She cast a spell on me right before I went to go fight the massive fiend."

Everyone's glance turned towards Yuna, "I cast a strength and protection spell on him. That's the reason you only got a bump on your head when the claw hit you. But the spell took up all the energy to fend off that one blow; it disappeared after you got back up. So all the swordsmanship was entirely you."

The human sat completely puzzled, _But how?_

"I guess it doesn't matter how he did it, only that he has some really awesome sword skills, ya? And besides, the fiend's dead so we have nothing to worry about now. We might as well keep going to Kilika, ya?"

Everyone agreed and they gathered up their supplies to head to Kilika.

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It is done. I'm so happy I finally go to do a fight seen as I've never had the chance to. Yay! What awaits our adventurures when they arrive at Kilika? Find out in the next chapter: "A City of Ashes". 

And **REVIEW**! Because it makes me happy.

And a big thanks goes out to PrincessDarkFire who's been spreading the word of my story. See everyone next update!

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